Eastern Kentucky geography

I am thinking about a quick jaunt to Eastern Kentucky.  This post is just a place to "hang" a few pieces of information with some maps to go with them.  I need to fill in some "space" so that my maps won't have interference with my side "stuff"....so I am going to chat for a few paragraphs.  If you are reading this and you are really interested, feel free to skip down to the maps.  My ancestors who lived in Eastern Kentucky were the Salmons clan.  My mother's grandfather was Henry Clay Sammons.  His wife, my mom's grandmother, was Sarah Jane Wooten.  The Wooten family were also in Eastern Kentucky very early.

Roland/Rowland Salmons is said by Ruth Sammons Nassar to have been buried:

Ruth says that Rowland was buried in the small plot set aside for a cemetery on the Beaver Creek Farm.  Frankie was buried beside him.  She was about 89 at the time of her death.

 My dad (who married into the Sammons family, LOVED to tell the story that "there were so many Roland Salmons in the hollows of Eastern Kentucky that they had to go by nicknames to keep everyone straight."  Then dad would come up with a few of the nick names:  Booger man, hmmmm can't do anymore from memory tonight.

I have the following in my data base:

 Roland was a very private, but strongly patriarchal, and except for land transactions, which were numerous, he seldom appears in public records of any kind.  For one reason, the farm on Baker’s branch was located in an area isolated by Tug River on the east, Levisa Fork on the west, and mountains to the south.  The Tug and Levisa converge north of his home, at Louisa, to form the Big Sandy.  There were no bridges, no roads, and in wet seasons the rivers were not easily forded.

OK...these two pieces of information tell me that I have some land research to do.  It would seem that a farm on Beaver Creek (on atlas, look just north of the town of Martin.  I do not know how far north this Creek flows.  But I am sure that it does not flow as far north as Louisa.  So it would appear that these are two separate farms.  According to Ruth Sammons Nassar, there will be many land transactions to view.  

Then the Wootens who seemed to have settled on George's Creek on the Levisa Fork of the Big Sandy....





Silas P. Wooten:

1804 Silas received a land grant of 400 acres at Georges Creek on Levisa Fork of

Big Sandy River Certificate #115-- date of the Survey was Nov 6, 1804.